


Osculate

by EmeraldTulip



Category: IT (2017), IT (2019), IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Beverly Marsh & Richie Tozier Are Best Friends, Canon - Book & Movie Combination, Canon Compliant, Canon Gay Character, Canonical Character Death, Confessions, Forehead Touching, GOD theres so much forehead touching, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Minor Ben Hanscom/Beverly Marsh, Richie Tozier & Stanley Uris Are Best Friends, Richie Tozier Loves Eddie Kaspbrak, Richie Tozier is a Mess, Time Skips, also uh, but only because Stanley is dead sorry stan, its sad though im sorry, thats why I wrote this, you know you're Richies bestie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-29
Updated: 2019-08-29
Packaged: 2020-09-28 23:41:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,795
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20434406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmeraldTulip/pseuds/EmeraldTulip
Summary: Eddie doesn’t reply for what feels like hours, and Richie thinks he may just have fallen asleep. As soon as that idea crosses his mind, however, Eddie lifts his head and reaches out. His hands come up to the junction of Richie’s neck and jaw, his head tilting forward until their foreheads are pressed together, and Richie’s breath stutters, glasses slipping down his nose.





	Osculate

**Author's Note:**

> I got an anon about forehead touches and I absolutely melted. I blended book and movie canon btw. heres this mess.

If Richie looks on the bright side, eighty-six percent of his original friend group is intact. Six out of seven.

If Richie thinks about that too hard, fourteen percent starts to sound like a whole lot, especially considering it could increase any second.

He flops onto the bed instead, tracing the seams until he finds a loose thread. Maybe, if he pulls it hard enough, the whole blanket will unravel, and then he’ll have to spend the whole night fixing it, and then he can focus on each individual pattern sewn into the cloth, and he won’t have to think about—

A knock on his door startles him out of his thoughts, and he sits up. “Yeah?” he calls, hating how his voice shakes, because god forbid this is another trick from the stupid clown.

“Richie?” the voice answers, and Richie blows out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.

He crosses the room in three long strides and yanks the door open. Eddie is standing there, hand still raised, fingers curled into a fist, and Richie can’t help but grin. Just a little. “Hey, Eddie. Couldn’t sleep?”

He moves aside and Eddie takes a few slow steps into his room. “Yeah,” he says as Richie closes the door behind them. “You, too?”

Richie shakes his head, stalking back across the room and plopping down on the edge of the bed. “Nah.” There isn’t even a joke he could crack that would make Eddie smile right now, and that thought hits him like he’s been punched. He stares up at Eddie, who’s still standing, shifting from foot to foot as if he’s uncomfortable being here. He can’t help but snort a little.

Eddie hears him, of course, and instantly fixes him with a hard stare. “What?”

For a minute, the Eddie of twenty-seven years ago flashes before him—same sharp words, soft eyes, tight jaw. “Sit down, Eds,” he says, patting the bed next to him. If he didn’t know any better, he’d say Eddie has a flush to his cheeks. Nevertheless, Eddie shuffles forward and sits, leaving several inches of space between them.

This morning, Richie had no way of remembering, but now he can recall autumn nights spent climbing the side of Eddie’s house and into his window, spring days at the quarry. Sometimes Eddie would call him gross and scoot away from him, probably because of all the dirt and grime he dragged himself through. Usually, though, the concept of “personal space” had been left long forgotten.

He supposes twenty-seven years is enough time to rebuild those boundaries, but maybe—just maybe—one night can bring back over a decade of friendship.

“Come on, Eds, I don’t have the plague.” He pats the gap on the blanket that sits between them again. “How am I supposed to talk to you if you’re all the away over there?”

“I’m a foot away from you, Rich,” Eddie huffs, but he slides over anyway. “And I’m not still twelve, you know, you don’t have to keep calling me that.”

“Yeah. I know.”

After a beat, Eddie must realize that the silence pouring off of Richie in waves isn’t exactly normal. “I, uh.” He stumbles over himself, and Richie is about to say something to save him from embarrassment, but Eddie just sighs, tilting his head to peer at him. “Richie,” he says, and coming from him it sounds less like a name and more like a prayer. He scoots even closer, leaning his head onto Richie’s shoulder. “I missed you.”

Richie’s mouth goes dry, because earlier in the evening he’d had very low expectations for this trip. Die, like Stan, probably. Not this—not Eddie, his skin warm and pulse steady. “I missed you, too.”

Richie can feel Eddie’s eyelashes against his collarbone as he buries his face into his neck. “What do you think is gonna happen?”

“I don’t know.” It’s a lie—Richie knows, somehow, that something terrible will happen. It isn’t that he’s just worried, or scared. He _knows_. But he won’t tell Eddie that.

Eddie doesn’t reply for what feels like hours, and Richie thinks he may just have fallen asleep. As soon as that idea crosses his mind, however, Eddie lifts his head and reaches out. His hands come up to the junction of Richie’s neck and jaw, his head tilting forward until their foreheads are pressed together, and Richie’s breath stutters, glasses slipping down his nose.

“I don’t want to lose you again,” Eddie says, his breath coming in puffs against Richie’s face, and now more than ever there’s an ache in Richie’s chest that longs for the past, for better days, for childhood, for Stan, for _Eddie_—even though Richie _knows_ that their childhood wasn’t all that great, and that he had been so eager to grow up. Despite that… anything is better than this. Anything. It has to be.

_You won’t,_ Richie wants to say, but that’s a lie too because really, who knows?

* * *

(“Rich,” Eddie chokes out, and Richie feels the telltale burn of tears behind his eyes as he hunches over Eddie’s sprawled out body. “Richie.”

“Yeah, Eds,” Richie replies, trying to keep his voice steady, because _fuck_ there’s so much blood but Eddie’s looking up at him and—

Eddie sucks in a rattling breath, reminding Richie so much of his fake asthma attacks when they were kids. When they were _kids_. “Richie,” he says again. “Don-n’t want to lose you.”

Richie’s throat is closing up, like he’s having an allergic reaction, pure fear filling every nerve. Pennywise’s tricks have never made him feel like this. Not even close. Maybe this is how Eddie always feels—felt, when they were younger. “I know,” he says. “I don’t—I can’t…”

Eddie’s fingers are bloody when he lifts them, and his hand is shaking so badly he accidentally gets red fingerprints on Richie’s glasses before he finally fits his palm against Richie’s cheek. “Richie.” It’s barely a whisper.

There’s a surge of desperation and anger that reaches all the way through Richie’s body. “Eddie, dammit,” he growls, and as gently as he can to avoid jarring Eddie, hoists him up. He’s mostly unsuccessful—Richie isn’t particularly strong, and Eddie is quite a bit taller than when they’d last seen each other—and he and Eddie essentially wind up in the sloppiest, bloodiest hug in all existence. “Dammit, you’re _not_ dying.”

He feels Eddie’s ribcage expand rapidly and then compress. He’s _laughing_.

Richie lets Eddie sit back slightly, so he can see his face. His white teeth stand out against his grimy face, and Richie feels a hand still on the side of his neck. He’s still laughing, the motherfucker. “Eds, what—?”

“Don’t c-call me Eds,” Eddie rasps, and his fingers seem to relax against Richie’s skin.

“No, no, Eds, Eddie…” Richie frantically covers Eddie’s fingers on his face with his own, letting his other hand press to Eddie’s jaw. “_Eddie_.”

Eddie isn’t giggling like a dumbass anymore, but there’s a soft smile on his face. The same smile he always used to wear when Richie said something stupid, or did something stupid, or was stupid. “You know,” he says, and Richie can feel his breath coming in short bursts against his face. “I…”

His head tips forward, coming to rest against Richie’s own forehead, his dark hair matted down enough so that Richie can feel its itch on his face. His skin is is clammy but he’s still warm, _come on Eddie come on_.

Eddie’s eyes are open, staring at him, his lips apart, and Richie tries to count how many shallow breaths he’s still taking. Even as Eddie’s fingers slowly slacken against Richie’s face, Richie’s fingers scrabble for purchase against Eddie’s, trying to bring him closer, _closer_.

By the time Bill’s hand lands on his shoulder, Richie realizes that he’s kept mumbling numbers long after there was anything to count.)

* * *

“You couldn’t have known,” Beverly says, quietly, as though raising her voice at all might break him.

He’s not sure that’s entirely wrong.

“But I could have—I should’ve—”

“Richie.” Bev is kind, and warm, and soft, and she isn’t Eddie. “Richie, please.”

He’s shaking, harder than he ever thought was possible. It’s like he’ll never be warm again; it doesn’t matter that Bev is rubbing his arms up and down, bringing heat to his skin through friction. “He _died_, Bev, and I did _nothing_. I killed him.”

“No,” she says, almost desperately now, and she lurches forward to cup his face. “No, Richie, you didn’t. You _didn’t_.”

“I told him—I _told_ him,” Richie gasps, and he feels like he’s drowning, “that he was braver than he thought. And he _listened_, the _dumbass_, and got himself killed for me. He died for _me_. And we just _left_ him there.”

Beverly opens her mouth, then closes it, rubbing a hand across her jaw. There is regret in her eyes.

“I love him,” Richie says, and it’s less like ripping off a band-aid and more like tearing out his own heart. “Loved him.” It’s been two years, and he still can’t bear to change tenses. Can’t do it without making himself.

Bev falls silent for a moment, and the sound of Ben soothing baby Eli downstairs drifts up to the room. She sighs, falling forward just enough until her forehead touches his, her hair falling into his eyes. “I know.”

The red curtain hides his face from the outside world, but now she’s behind it with him. He knows she can see the tears in his eyes, only magnified by his glasses. “I’m sorry, Bev,” he says.

“No,” she says firmly. “I am. You have no reason to be.”

He pulls back so he can take his glasses off; rubs his eyes. “It’s been enough time. I shouldn’t… I shouldn’t _cry_ whenever I come over here, unless it’s to be happy about Elizabeth.”

There’s a fond, sad look on her face. Richie didn’t think it was possible to see those at the same time. “It’s okay to be sad, you know. Broken, even. It doesn’t matter how long it’s been. You can be happy about some things while still being devastated.” And Richie knows it isn’t fair to be mad at her. But she has Ben, and she has a child, and she has a _life_ that Eddie never did. It’s easy for her to be happy in spite of her misery. It isn’t for him—he hasn’t felt happy in ages.

Richie feels a tear escape, sliding down his cheek. “I don’t want to be sad anymore,” he admits. “I wish we’d just forgotten, like the first time.”

“But then you wouldn’t know him at all,” Beverly says, and Richie thinks: _I wish I didn’t._

**Author's Note:**

> this was titled "jnhbgvftcrdsfghjvb forehead touches. are like. wow" in my drafts  
comments and kudos are, as always, appreciated.  
find me on tumblr, my main is [@perseusjaxon](https://perseusjaxon.tumblr.com) and my writing blog is [@lowriting](https://lowriting.tumblr.com)!


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